


Falling So Hard So Slow

by Philosophizes



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Growing Up, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2015-02-08
Packaged: 2018-03-11 04:20:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3313703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philosophizes/pseuds/Philosophizes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Feliciano, <i>Repubblica italiana, veneziano,</i> has always looked at Germany and hoped for Ludwig, ever since their first meeting after Caporetto.</p>
<p>Germany takes two World Wars to figure out what that means.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling So Hard So Slow

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally going to be a much bigger story, with two or three more chapters to connect this to some of my other works, but as of now I don't think that's going to go anywhere. So have the first part, and enjoy.

The German Empire had heard from his brother about the alliance between Prussia and Venice in the war that had birthed him, but in the tumult of a united Italy and the gearing up of industry, he had never yet met the man who had been the Republic he’d read of, that had passed with quiet dignity when Napoleon came.

Up through Caporetto, he had been wondering if maybe, now he would. The army was advancing swiftly towards Venice and it would make sense, wouldn’t it, that the one they still called _‘Veneziano’_ would be here, at this battle.

This battle was the first one the Empire had ever had without Prussia- better to say, this was his first _battle,_ plain and simple. Prussia had tried to keep him home, and eventually he’d been won around to taking the Empire out to the battle lines- but never in the active fighting, he was always being told _‘stay back stay back’_ and Prussia had put him on supply lines, on logistics, like a _child._

Austria had asked for an allied Nation for this offensive, though, and the Empire had bypassed Prussia completely and asked Command for the assignment and they were _more_ than pleased to give it to him, so now here he was, out on a battlefield and-

People died. Easily. He hadn’t-

It was silly. It was ridiculous. Childish and juvenile and inane but he wanted Prussia and Prussia wasn’t here so he’d just- the stick was solid, firm, _there_ in his hand. Not like the poison gas they’d flooded the soldiers with or the way the line had broken, how the Italian men were surrendering willingly.

He was on his own in the woods now. Backup hadn’t been offered and he knew better than to ask- he was a Nation. He was the Empire. He would not be felled by any human, much less a foreigner.

The crate… the crate was just too much. He had been thinking of this Veneziano as- as- as someone like Prussia, someone strong and brave and loyal and honorable and here he was _cowering in the woods-_

* * *

Feliciano didn’t know how old he was because the Adriatic Veneti had not really been into calendars, but that was what archaeology was for, really, so something over 2,600 years was a long time to see a lot of things and he had! He’d seen a lot of beautiful things, so many beautiful things, from everywhere and everyone and sometimes the terrible things were beautiful too, but not always.

There was a terrible beauty to the German Empire, in the really Romantic sort of way, a loneliness and a lostness and roiling emotion and soul-sick like how the poets said the cities made you, though Feli had never been sick of his city- sick _because_ of it, in the epidemics; and sick _for_ it, in the conquests; but never _of it_ , Venice was _him_ it was _his_ \- but looking at the German Empire he could see how one could. The man- the boy- this young Empire not quite yet half a century old, an elder statesman to the humans but a barely anything to a Nation, he belonged in an oil painting, something dark and feral and Feliciano was picturing coastal rocks with a storm rolling in, or maybe a mountain with the same; or else a cramped attic with a guttering lamp and reams and reams of tortured poetry that would be lauded as brilliant and his early death, _‘young, so young, too young’_ they’d say, mourned as a great tragedy-

A Nation that never saw his first century. Now that _would_ be a tragedy.

And as the war turned it was a tragedy that seemed more and more likely to come true, and Feliciano was passed back and forth and back and forth for no real reason he could see, as completely pointless and aimless as this entire damn war, and thinking about it was just the recipe for a black mood and… Feliciano didn’t want that. Not for himself, and not for the German Empire, who shouldn’t be so sad and so tired so young and Feliciano couldn’t look at him but for thinking of his own soldiers, the eighteen-year-old conscripts who were adults under the law but children under anything that mattered, and the German Empire could maybe, _maybe_ pass himself off for eighteen. Feliciano was thinking fifteen, sixteen- tall from his sudden growth and gaining muscle but without any real weight and every so often you could see the soul-sickness of war behind the competence and the bluster.

So Feliciano found a guitar and sang and silently promised the Empire that what he had was the soul-sick of war and not the soul-sick of the city and that he, he personally, Feliciano Costa-newly-Vargas would show him the beauty of Berlin and Venice too, if he wanted, and that the war be gone and done and over and if he had any say in it, it wouldn’t come again.

Something nice should come of hell like this; or else why? Why try?

* * *

The Empire had promised him power and there was humiliation; the Revolution has promised him power and there was poverty; and at least with the Empire he’d had Prussia but now Prussia was in Königsburg and not speaking to him and rightfully so, he thought on the bad days and he was pretty sure they were _all_ bad days now, because it _had_ been Prussia who had put the Empire together and kept it together and it _had_ only fallen apart after he put himself in charge, hadn’t it?

His money was worthless and his people were starving and he stopped going to work, he was so ashamed. He wandered the streets of Berlin and tried not to remember how it had felt when his factories had been running at their height and he’d been allowed an army and everything had been _good-_ back before he’d ever seen a dead body.

The dogs he kept were starving, too. It was petty in the face of everything else but this was _personal,_ this was his direct responsibility and he was failing it, so badly.

Veneziano showed up, one day, in his new uniform, and handed him a basket of food and produced treats for the dogs and cooed at them, petting and praising and smiling freely while Germany stared at the basket of food in his hands and tried to think about who to give it to. Eventually he decided and Veneziano gently shooed the dogs out and followed him, ambling along behind and ready with a smile for everyone and kind, flirty little compliments to passing women, aimed at getting a smile back and a bit of sunshine for the lady in question during dreary times as Germany delivered the food.

The way back to Germany’s house- Prussia’s house, he couldn’t think of it as his, it had been Brandenburg’s and then it was Prussia’s and it was _still_ Prussia’s- had them walking through twilight, and the streetlamps came on some minutes before and Germany _hated_ it, hated how Veneziano was seeing his weakness and his shame and how his people were suffering and the ending day had hid how empty and useless he felt but now the electricity that had seemed so bright and new and wonderful not so long ago was just a reminder of what he’d lost, the power of an industrial nation.

He let them in the door and before he could turn any lights on, while they were still in the shadows of the night cut through by the hard white of the lights outside and Veneziano blended in perfectly with the night with his black uniform, Feliciano threw his arms around his shoulders and whispered in his ear: _“I remember what it was like to have power, too.”_

A gentle kiss on the check, then; and gone.

* * *

Governments came and went and politics came and went and Feliciano was content to wait out the fascists, content to listen politely and applaud when he was ordered and do damage control when he needed too, just as Nations throughout the millennia had always done. They had good things they promised, and he was happy to let the good things come as they would and hold onto them once the fascists had gone.

Feliciano felt like he should have noticed, the way Germany always eyed his new uniform.

No; he’d noticed. It was nice, to think that he could make people look him up and down and _want,_ the way he’d seen Germany wanting, but-

Germany wanted the uniform and the power in it, the relief and the revenge that power could promise. Not the person in it- the person who didn’t want to go to war and couldn’t, not one bit, understand why _‘Germany’_ got a look of recognition, but _‘Ludwig’_ just a polite acknowledgement.

“Why do you call me _‘Ludwig’_?” the other Nation asked one day. He had his new uniform, dark just like Feliciano’s was. “The humans call me that.”

“Of course they do,” Feliciano said, trying not to look puzzled and concerned. “That’s your name.”

“Hm,” the Third Reich said noncommittally.

Feliciano and Gilbert traded worried looks behind his back.

* * *

The Third Reich’s army blitzkreiged through Poland and Belgium and Denmark and the Netherlands and France and Austria and Hungary and all of Europe and it was everything the Empire had promised but never delivered.

The Third Reich followed his army where they went, and read the propaganda instead of walking the battlefields after the soldiers had fallen; and managed supply lines and barracks instead of asking for the lists of the political prisoners and undesirables.

* * *

The Third Reich was acting less like the Third Reich and more like just Germany but less like just Germany and more like what Feliciano _hoped,_ really _really **hoped,**_ had been praying and wishing, was what Ludwig, the man-who-was-the-Nation but whom the Nation seemed determined to ignore, was actually like.

Feliciano had not been hoping for much in this war, or this alliance, for some time. At first it had been good but then it was war and they’d _had_ the Great War, this was supposed to be _over-_

He knew Gilbert was intercepting his brother’s orders and having the written ones burned and the telegraphed or telephoned ones routed to some orderly, written down, and _then_ stolen and incinerated. Feliciano had sat with Gilbert, a few times, as he fed the orders and the reprimands and demands to know why the things they’d ordered the Third Reich to do hadn’t been done to the flames, and listened as he talked about his brother.

Feliciano had also seen the lists and forms and plans about the camps on Gilbert’s desk. He hadn’t wanted to ask, but-

Gilbert looked at him, heavy-eyed, and said:

_“I can’t let him do that. I can’t let him end this war and **really** realize what his government is doing and have this weighing on him. He’s-”_

Gilbert hadn’t been able to finish, but Feliciano knew. Prussia had done a lot of things, just like Veneziano-once-Venice had done a lot of things, and they knew how to deal. Germany wouldn’t. Didn’t.

The first thing that flashed through Feliciano’s mind when the ring came out was: _‘God, **that’s** is what this is about? Why didn’t anyone **warn** me our governments were considering this?’_

The second thing was: _‘Please, please God, no- **not the Nazis.** ’_

He refused, flat-out and more panicked than he wanted to have shown, and the Third Reich went away strangely crushed, and Feliciano couldn’t find it in him to be sorry.

Eventually, he was just relieved that their governments had apparently decided to actually _listen_ to the people for once, and not gone through with joining the countries, like what had happened with Austria.

* * *

He hadn’t been the German Empire for years and he- no. He would _not_ call himself the Third Reich. He had been answering to it and he _wouldn’t,_ any longer, and he couldn’t come up with what he thought of himself as in his head because he couldn’t remember ever referring to himself, he just _was_ in his head-

But he had a horrible feeling that the person he’d been trying to call _‘Germany’_ was this _‘Ludwig’_ Veneziano and Prus-

Feliciano and Gilbert.

-kept talking to.

His soldiers weren’t retreating simply because there was no place to go and why get shot at when trying to escape won’t get you anywhere?

_He_ wasn’t going anywhere because he was paralyzed with thinking: what was the _point?_ This war had left him no stronger than the last and he hadn’t _agreed_ with everything that his government had been saying but what was that worth?

He hadn’t done anything about it, either. Gilbert had done things. Feliciano and his brother had done things. Small things, comparatively, by necessity small given the way they were watched and the people they had to interact with every day but _something._ Even Japan had, likely, but what had _he_ done?

He’d disagreed in the privacy of his own head and ignored what they were doing. Ignored them as they carted away his people and ignored the times when he could have done _something_ and he remembered Lovino stopping just as he walked out the door, for the last time, after his brother, and looked back at him with such utter _disgust._

_“You are a traitor to your people,”_ he’d hissed. _“They deserve **better** than you.”_

Ludwig Beilschmidt gave up his gun to France in Strasbourg on the 23rd of November in 1944.

* * *

“Shhh, shhh- no! No! _Bad_ puppy!”

Feliciano was still trying to get the German Shepard, now almost three years old, to sit and be quiet when the door opened.

The Shepard immediately bounced a little on his front paws and barked, once, happily, straining against the leash Feliciano held to get to the man standing frozen in the doorway, staring between it and Feliciano.

Finally, his eyes rested on the dog and the defeated Nation dropped to his knees and pulled the Shepard into a tight hug, burying his face into the dog’s fur as it wagged its tail furiously and sniffed at him happily, checking to make sure he was all right.

_“Aster,”_ he kept mumbling; and Feliciano decided to give him a few minutes.

“I took him with me when I left,” he told his ex-ally. “We’d joined America and Britain and Russia and France so nobody was bombing _us_ but they _were_ going to bomb you and I didn’t want to leave Aster behind just in case-”

“I thought he’d died,” the other man said, voice getting a little choked with held-back tears. “I thought he’d run away and starved to death; or someone had stolen him and shot him-”

“Nope,” Feliciano reassured him. “He was with me the whole time. Well, not _always_ with me because I had to go places I couldn’t bring a dog but he was being taken care of. Can I come in?”

“I- I don’t have anything to host you with.”

“That’s okay,” he said; and dropped his voice conspiratorially, pairing it with a smile. “I brought some sweet things with me to share; I know how much you like them.”

  He was let into the house and was trailed awkwardly to the living room, where Feliciano pulled out the small box of candies he’d hidden in his coat and placed them on the side table. When he looked back at his host, he saw that he standing stock-still, one hand in Aster’s fur and half-eyeing the sweets while looking disbelievingly at Feliciano.

“You… aren’t mad?” he asked.

“Oh no, I’m _plenty_ mad,” Feliciano disagreed. “I’m mad at Vittorio for ruining the monarchy and I’m mad at Mussolini for _existing_ and I’m mad that we lost the war even though I know how bad it would have for a lot of people if we’d won it because we still _lost_ and I’m mad that my people are hurting and don’t have anything to show for it besides that we managed to leave on sort-of our terms _and_ I’m kind of still _really_ mad at Germany; like I’m not as mad as I _was_ and I’m not _nearly_ as mad as often I was but I’m still _really mad_.”

He opened the sweets box and stuck the cover underneath the body, tilting his head a little to look at the young man, still standing, some feet away from him.

“But you don’t want to know if I’m _mad. You_ want to know if I hate you. And I don’t. Not _personally._ I’m upset and I’m hurt and I’m really disappointed in you and depending on how this all goes I might actually get mad at you _personally_ but I don’t _hate_ you. And I’m worried about you besides, because you don’t have Gilbert and I haven’t been around and you didn’t have Aster so unless you’ve suddenly started spilling your soul to _America_ you haven’t been talking to _anyone_ and I can’t get Gilbert back for you and I can’t be around all the time the way I was but I _could_ bring you Aster. So I did.”   

“But I don’t- _why?_ ”

Feliciano gestured for him to sit next to him, and it took a moment, but he did.

“You’ve been really bad at this lately,” he said. “But I knew you before. And there were some things even when you were being horrible. And I think that someday you could be a good person, a _really_ good person, kind and gentle and thoughtful and caring and loving- not a good _Nation_ but you could be that too a good Nation with respect and power and influence because you _earned_ it or because other people tripped and stumbled and you didn’t but _not_ because you killed a bunch of people for it- and so because I saw you how cared about _all_ your people before the war and the ways you helped the soldiers you were in charge of and because you were careful with the refugee children and love your brother and worried about your dog and always wanted me to do better and _surrendered independently of your government_ I _know_ you _can_ be kind and gentle and all those things; and I _believe_ that you could become someone who never gives those up, ever again. So-”

Feliciano looked him straight in the eye, holding it, forming a moment of gravity.

_“Who are you?”_

The Nation looked back at him, silently, for a little too long; and Feliciano braced himself for an answer he didn’t want.

“I’m Ludwig,” Germany said.

And Feliciano smiled brightly in relief and joy and took his hands and said:

“It’s _really_ good to finally meet you, Ludwig.”


End file.
